COURIER-JOURNAL - Senior Judge Geoffrey P. Morris gave those responsible for the billboards 60 days to remove them in a case filed in 2008 by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.

He said the problem is not the religious content of the billboards, but rather the state's right to regulate billboard placement to preserve highway safety and scenic beauty.

“Our courts will not regulate nor impose their religious beliefs on any party,” Morris wrote in an opinion he filed on Friday in LaRue Circuit Court. But “legislative bodies may regulate … the placing of billboards on our highways. … One can well imagine the obvious trashing of our highways if there was no regulation in place and every resident that happened to live beside a highway was free to place whatever size sign that he/she wished to place.”